Modern Europe
into the past. Throughout, he takes an uncritical stance
toward nationalist historians and politicians who share
such conceptions. That the nation-creating process was
complete among Slovaks by the ninth century, that the
Slovaks in the sixteenth century were "the only nation
in Central Europe which had higher social classes than
just the peasantry" (p. 65), or that, by 1820, the Slovak
language had "produced a [body of] work that would
have also honored the great literatures [of the world]"
(p. 93) are dubious assertions that warrant critical
examination. The book at times reads like an effort to
build Slovak self-esteem.
While one can perhaps forgive Kirschbaum, a specialist on twentieth-century Slovak politics, for errors
such as the statements that Matyas Corvinus never
challenged the Hungarian barons or that the War of
Austrian Succession did not have serious consequences for the Habsburg Empire, more problematic
are some omissions and questionable interpretations
connected with recent Slovak history. Frantisek Jehlicka, a Hungarian agent whose ties with Slovaks
helped make Czechs suspicious of Slovak nationalism,
is never mentioned; Vojtech Tuka's public assertion
that Czechoslovakia's laws would cease to be valid in
Slovakia in 1928 is deemed a "minor issue," and Tuka
is incorrectly portrayed as becoming "bitterly antiCzech" only after his arrest in 1929. The Nitra demonstrations of 1933 are depicted as spontaneous, when
in fact they were orchestrated by Slovak nationalists.
Important developments during the period of the
Slovak Republic are left unexplained. The reader
never learns why Slovakia came up with its own
anti-Jewish policies apart from Nazi dictates, why
prominent Slovak leader Karol Sidor resigned from
the government in the spring of 1939, or why Berlin
foiled a coup attempt against Slovakia's President Tiso
in early 1941. Kirschbaum's attempt to finesse the
touchy issue of Jewish deportations under the Tiso
regime is unsatisfying, given the author's failure to
explore alternative reasons for the halting of the
deportations and exemptions given to Jews aside from
Tiso's alleged "political courage." The chapter on the
Slovak National Uprising of 1944 is one-sided and
polemical. Regarding the Hungarian question, that
minority's grievances against Slovak rule are mentioned only in the book's penultimate paragraph, and
no mention is made of the anti-Hungarian character of
Slovak demonstrations after 1989.
As the only sweeping survey of Slovakia's history
available in English, this book is worth reading. But
the reader will discover that this is history seen
through a nationalist lens. The book's contribution to
a scholarly understanding of Slovakia is thereby limited.
J AMES RAMON FELAK
University of Washington
ROBERT E. BLOBAUM. Rewolucja: Russian Poland,
1904-1907. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.
1995. Pp. xx, 300. $35.00.
AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW
1579
Popular historiography about the Revolution of 1905
consigns Polish developments to the periphery of
Russian imperial history. Yet the political turmoil in
the Polish lands contributed fundamentally to the
destabilization of imperial authority in these provinces
in the period preceding 1914. Robert E. Blobaum's
objective is "to examine upheavals in the Kingdom of
Poland in their own light, 'emancipated' as it were
from dubious Russian revolutionary 'parentage,' and
to study far more carefully the Polish revolution's
social actors" (p. xi).
This outstanding study, the first in English, presents
1905 as a defining moment in the emergence of
modern Polish political culture. The political and
social conditions of modern statehood came into place,
making the continuation of the imperial occupation
ever more untenable. Previously, the Marxist historians Stanislaw Kalabinski and Feliks Tych had asked
whether developments in the Polish lands between
1905 and 1907 were "The Fourth Insurrection or the
First Revolution" (Czwarte powstanie czy pierwsza rewolucja). The question linked the gentry-led Polish
struggle for national liberation with the Marxist preference for proletarian social and economic justice.
Their work, despite its ideological predisposition, reflected a Polish preoccupation with political history.
Nevertheless, the debut of workers and peasants as
independent political actors was revolutionary, and
Blobaum's account successfully integrates social and
political developments.
The opening chapter, an excellent introduction to
the relationship between the Russian state and the
Polish nation from the insurrection of 1863 to the eve
of 1905, finds that political "parties" were more conspiratorial sects than mass organizations but that opposition to Russification united all social groups. In
1904, economic dislocation and opposition to mobilization for the Russo-Japanese war emboldened social
and political discontent among workers, peasants, and
students. It was the Polish workers, however, whose
tenacity and numerical participation in the strike
movement through 1907 dwarfed that of their Russian
counterparts and made the "Polish revolution" worthy
of its name. Following upon worker activities, the
socialist parties in 1905 began penetrating and politicizing the labor movement in competition with the
National Democrats.
Blobaum details the political subtleties and organizational growth of the major political movement but
de-emphasizes the role of political parties, ideologies,
and personalities, emphasizing the "totality of social
experience of the revolutionary years" (p. 189). The
growth of organizations representing mass constituencies and the resulting democratization of Polish political culture reflects the revolutionary uniqueness of
1905 and distinguishes 1905 from earlier gentry-led
conspiracies and insurrections. Whereas previously the
question was whether peasants and workers could
participate in public life, after 1905 the issue was to
DECEMBER
1996
Reviews of Books
1580
what extent and how. Polish politics were no longer the
preserve of a social elite.
Revolution also came to the countryside. Agrarian
workers struck in 1905; the popular gmina movement
agitated to polonize and democratize local government; disputes over servitudes increased; and rural
vigilantism was rampant. Russian authority was not
permanently displaced, but the peasantry of Russian
Poland for the first time actively engaged in political
life. There were also school strikes and a partially
successful struggle to polonize private education, in
which the National Democrats and Polska Maderz
Szkolna (Polish Motherland Schools) were prominent.
The one national institution that only partially accommodated itself to burgeoning national aspirations was
the Catholic Church. Ultimately, it backed away from
the opportunity to embrace Western-style Catholic
social action and to expand its mission.
By November, 1905, the Russian imperial government could make concessions like those granted to the
Finns and restore political autonomy to the Kingdom
or restore order by martial law. Opting for the latter, a
peaceful Russian solution to the Polish question was
impossible, and Russian rule in the Kingdom "thereafter rested irrevocably on military occupation" (p.
261).
Blobaum draws extensively on national and provincial archives and on the fresh, insightful works of a new
generation of Polish social historians. If 1905 is the
dawn of modern Polish mass movements, however,
more discussion of the failure of liberalism to attract
popular support might provide insights about the
character of Polish nationalism. Also, 1905 roiled the
political leadership of the Polish immigrant community in America. This aside, the study is a major
contribution and marks Blobaum as an important
scholar.
STANISLAUS A. BLEJWAS
Central Connecticut State University
CHRISTOPHER BENNETT. Yugoslavia's Bloody Collapse:
Causes, Course and Consequences. New York: New
York University Press. 1995. Pp. xv, 272. $24.95.
Christopher Bennett's book falls roughly into three
parts: first, historical background up to the beginning
of the end of Yugoslavia'S Communist regime in the
mid-1980s; second, a political analysis of the events
that marked the breakup of the country and the
descent into warfare; and third, a critique of the recent
policies of all concerned, especially of outside powers.
The historical part tells the general reader who the
Yugoslavs are, how they happened to come together in
one state after World War I and again after the
dissolution and partition of the state in World War II,
and what held them together during the following
half-century of Communist rule. The account, though
brief, is more than adequate, for Bennett displays a
remarkable ability to explain complex subject matter in
clear and simple terms. On some points the explana-
AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW
tions may appear to others acquainted with the record
to be too brief or too simple-for example, on the role
of the Partisans in World War II or on the circumstances of the Tito-Stalin break in 1948-but not
substantially so. One reason that the Communists'
power lasted as long as it did under Tito, Bennett
rightly notes, was his government's insistence that no
nationality would be under the domination of another.
As a war correspondent covering recent events,
Bennett had a distinct advantage over his journalistic
rivals. He was in the country as a student in the 1980s
and knew its major languages and something of its
politics before reporting on the war, and his account
shows it. He makes a bit too much, however, of the
naivete of Western journalists and officials in attributing the outbreak of hostilities and the cruelty with
which they have been conducted to ancient hatreds
and traditional Balkan bestiality instead of to the
ambitions, strengths, and weaknesses of current political leaders. Bennett points the finger at one man in
particular, Serbia's Slobodan Milosevi6, who found a
chance for greater power and glory in the cause of
building Greater Serbia on the ruins of Yugoslavia.
Others also took the measure of Milosevi6, or thought
they did, for at no time did he show all his cards.
Once the fighting started, with the Serbs as the
primary aggressors, old stereotypes and extreme visions reappeared on all sides, and atrocities bred
atrocities. Croats saw Serbs as trying to deny them
their right to independence and to annex large slices of
their territory. Serbs feared a revival of Croat Ustasi
extremism and the mass murders of World War II.
Both were drawn to intervene in Bosnia, while Muslims there were driven to assert a new and stronger
nationalism of their own.
With incisive criticism, Bennett shows how the
Western powers were played for fools by Milosevi6 and
the Bosnian Serbs. The only favorable thing he has to
say about British and French policies is that, while
morally indefensible, they were understandable. Why
should those powers intervene in a bloody civil war in
the Balkans when their own vital interests were not
seen to be at stake? Better to stick to humanitarian aid
and the diplomatic effort for peaceful settlement
(although it was going nowhere).
When Bennett was writing about "prospects," he
expected-not without reason-that general situation
to continue. But the more it remained the same, the
more it began to change. France, under Jacques Chirac, opted for a stronger policy. Croatia recaptured
most of the territory lost to the Serbs in 1991, helping
to create a map based on more ethnic cleansing than
ever but nevertheless with a more favorable balance
for a political settlement. And the United States
emerged from its dithering to push all the parties into
the agreement reached at Dayton, Ohio, in late 1995.
Whatever else these developments meant, they seemed
to mark the end of the dream of Greater Serbia.
Milosevi6 calmly took over negotiating authority from
the Serbs of Bosnia and sold them and their confreres
DECEMBER
1996